Generally speaking, an image forming apparatus is an apparatus that forms an image on a printing medium. Examples of image forming apparatuses include a printer, a photocopier, a facsimile, a multifunction apparatus combining some of the functions thereof, and the like.
An image forming apparatus may include a paper feeding unit to store sheets of paper or other printing media, a plurality of rollers to feed the paper, and a printing unit to print images on the paper fed from the paper feeding unit. The paper received in the paper feeding unit may be picked up sheet by sheet by a pickup roller, and may be fed further by one or more rollers, for example, by what is often referred to as a registration roller.
The operation of the registration roller may typically be suspended while the paper is being picked up. When a sheet of paper picked up by the pickup roller comes into contact with the registration roller, the leading end of the paper becomes aligned. In such a state, the registration roller is made to rotate to feed the sheet of paper toward the printing unit.
Efforts to improve the printing speed of such image forming apparatuses has brought about some improvement in the paper feeding speed as well. However, unfortunately, as the paper feeding speed has seen an increase, the noise resulting from the paper colliding with the registration roller has also become a concern. Thus, an image forming apparatus capable of operating at reduced the operational noise is desired.